October in Oregon

We are having a grand time with Kajsa, Brad, and the kids!  Remote schooling is going pretty well — Sammy works pretty hard most of the time.  Of course, he’s a 2nd grader and so there ‘are’ exceptions to that.  Judith and I are learning ways to motivate him to focus, including playing Blackjack (21) for addition & subtraction skills, and Scrabble for spelling.  Now, if we can only find a trick for motivating writing….

We had a science outing tp the Richfield National Wildlife Refuge nearby to study birds and wildlife behavior.   With a little practice, Sammy could be a pretty good little birder! We saw Great Blue Heron, Lesser Yellowlegs, Great Egret, female American Wigeon, Ring-Necked Duck, Wood Duck, Harrier, and Red-tailed Hawk.  Sammy was particularly excited by the Red-tailed Hawk who posed for us very nicely.

   

We have a healthy ‘bubble’ that includes the family, and we have enjoyed numerous meals with the family.   Throughout most of September and October we have been able to enjoy meals on their back deck, sometimes picking up food from local restaurants – like the burrito shop a couple blocks away.

 

Their son, Anders, celebrated his Fourth Birthday recently.  It was a Red, White, and Blue, American Flag celebration.  As a special bonus, three baby goats visited the party!  Everybody got a chance to hold the baby goats, even Aunt Judy!

 

 

Of course, it is not all fun and games.  Sometimes there is homework to do!

We did a science project – investigating a Buckeye nut.

Tooie had a good time investigating Sammy’s book bag.  She really ‘got into it’!

Of course, she’s a whiz at the computer!

 

Our old lead-acid batteries finally came to the end of their life.  Sammy supervised the installation of our new Lithium batteries.   With the change we went from 8 golf cart batteries (62# each) to 3 Ohmmu Lithium batteries (31# each) for a weight savings of over 400#!  I re-used one of the old battery boxes for the lithium batteries, and we are using the other one for storage.

 

Halloween is now upon us.   Sammy and Judith had fun making some masks.  Then everyone came over for Trick-or-Treat!

 

Schools are not expected to re-open for in-person classes until late January.  So this will likely be our home for a while.  It is such a pleasure spending time with Kajsa, Brad, and the boys!

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